“Your Grace.” Drumman’s flush had not abated. He looked like a man screwing up his courage for a desperate statement. “Our several clerks can inform you what may not be in Your Grace’s accounts from the lord viceroy’s tenure andfrom Lord Heryn’s. And they will be true accounts.”
“If the tax harms the villages, I’ll inform His Majesty, who knows the state of affairs here as well as I: he has no wish to impoverish the province.”
“That Your Grace will look into the matter of the accounts is more justice than Amefel has seen in a hundred years,” Cuthan said. “And Bryn will arm in good order.”
“Aye,” said Azant, and, “Aye,” from Drumman, and there seemed a great relief among the lords, down to Cook’s fine apple tarts. There was laughter, now, and good humor, but not quite free good humor: he marked that; and the conversation was on the snow and how the winter would go, in their estimation, which was that the snow might deepen early, or it might not. In the one case they might be held from establishing supply at the bridges; in the other they would not. It informed him, it was interesting, what condition the roads might be in, for his plans for the spring; yet the lords were easing their way carefully through harmless subjects, and the looks that flew from Drumman to Cuthan and from Cuthan to Drumman when the other was holding forth were not happy looks.
They were men divided by the rebellion, he thought, and men still divided by their opinions, not all of which he had heard.
And more than that had risen up to trouble him. He had judged the temper of the town itself as one thing— but he judged the temper of the earls as another. It was far more complex a weave, and shot through with betrayals and old jealousies; and it did not give him comfort at all in what he had heard.
Guards and even Guard captains did not drink or eat at table with their lord. But Uwen, Lusin, and Anwyll were amenable to a cup of ale in the privacy of their lord’s apartment, to lean back and talk in informality. So Cefwyn was wont to speak to Idrys in private; and so he and Uwen were accustomed to do. Tonight he invited Lusin and Anwyll. Lusin was not surprised; his fellows were on duty at the door, as guards always were, and he settled down with a cup and sighed with relief not to be standing. Anwyll was the most ill at ease, but accepted a cup, too.
So they all sat by the fire with sleet rattling against the tall, velvet-shrouded windows.
“Cuthan deserves his reputation,” Tristen said to begin with. “I think if Edwyll had ruled for a time before being besieged by the Marhanen, Drumman and Azant might have joined him, but Cuthan wouldn’t. And he’d have been safe. If Tasmôrden had come in, Drumman and Azant would have ruled with Edwyll; but I think Cuthan would still have survived. And if His Majesty had come and taken the town, Cuthan would have been quick to come forward as a loyal man, and Cuthan would still have survived, and become very close to whatever duke Cefwyn appointed. If Cuthan doesn’t lead, others do; but if he leads, others follow him. Am I right?”
“If his lordship o’ Bryn had joined wi’ Edwyll,” Uwen observed, pouring himself and Anwyll a cup of ale, “we’d ha’ had a hellish ride up them streets. But thank the gods not all on ’em joined. They might ha’ hailed arrows down on us off ever’ rooftop in the town.”
That thought had certainly been with them during the ride up from the gates. The thought that had occurred to him during dinner was no more comfortable. “Might Bryn have been forewarned? Might he have seen Ryssand’s letter, and known we were coming? And if he, then did Edwyll, all along, know whom he was fighting? Or why, outside of prudence or loyalty to the king, did the restof the lords hold back from supporting Edwyll? Why were they not on those rooftops?”
He had sharp looks from all three captains, and he doubted it was the first question they had had inside themselves.
“I’d look careful at Drumman,” Uwen said, “who I think was closest to goin’ wi’ the rebels. Drumman knew what was toward, didn’t he, or the lady wouldn’t be shelterin’ there from the time Edwyll done what he done? I think the viceroy spilled what he knew to somebody like Lord Cuthan. Maybe Edwyll didn’t believe anything the viceroy said, and took the courtyard wi’ the notion to hold it and see what terms might be, but the others was again’ it. ’At’s my humble guess.”
Drumman had sheltered Crissand’s mother. But at the last Drumman had come to the stable-court to support the king’s forces, leaving only Crissand to stand by his father once the rumor of Mauryl’s heir had run the streets. Lord Sihhë! the people had shouted—and had the whole town foreknown and awaited his coming, while Edwyll attempted to bar him from the citadel?
Tristen listened, and asked himself had Edwyll possibly done what he had done knowingly? Had Edwyll opposed him, or had Edwyll intended to hand over the citadel if the rumors of his appointment were true? Crissand had commanded that the defense in the South Court go on, having had no such instruction, quite clearly; and held and held while he waited for his father to send word down from the apartment where he had gone… had continued the defense while even Drumman had joined the other side and while they had shouted through the gate, clearly naming who offered a cessation of hostilities and a way out without more deaths.
But no word came from the earl his father. So Crissand held, and held, not knowing Edwyll was dead, a tragic waste of lives almost equal to what the viceroy had done.
Tristen turned a somber look toward Uwen. “If there was an ill-working,” he said to Uwen, “it did its worst that night.”
But the thought that Edwyll might have fought against him knowingly, when the son professed loyalty more strongly, more extravagantly than Cuthan, whom he strongly suspected. Had Crissand, the brave, the loyal man—had Crissand lied to him so deeply, so callously?
There was one ground where truth shone through— and in pain he reached out on the instant, seeking truth, caring nothing for caution, and had an impression exactly where Crissand was. More, he suddenly had Crissand’s attention. A cup had shattered, there, not here. Crissand had leapt up, caught his balance.
—Have you lied to me? he asked Crissand directly, while the gray space roiled with cloud as bitter cold as what spat sleet at the windows. Have you lied?
—My lord!the thought came back, and Crissand reached wildly for substance and direction, lost, and afraid, not accustomed to this place, and snatched into it without warning. My lord, wherein should you say I lied? Where have I sinned against you?
He found not guile, no guilt. He saw Crissand, a shadowy form in the mist and the roiling cloud. He willed himself closer and was there, and saw Crissand’s distress face-to-face.
—Your father told you nothing of his dealings. He sent your mother to Drumman and prepared to stand me off… did he not? Did he not, sir? And how many others stood with him?
Fear washed back at him, a tide through the gray space. Crissand attempted flight, but had no skill at all… had never ventured here, clearly so. To have found otherwise would have raised other questions, of wizardry, and theft and knowledge. And he meant to know the answers.
—Mauryl’s letters are gone from the archive and the master archivist is dead, the other fled. Do you know aught of that, sir, or did your father?
“M’lord?” Uwen asked.
—Do you know, sir?
Fear crashed around him, palpable as the winds. — My lord, Crissand said, and tried to leave his presence, but he did not let Crissand go.
—Why did your father act? Why did he move when he did? Dare you call it chance?